


Technician Lapis

by RiverDelta



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/F, Slow Burn, Technician Lapis AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-15
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-24 17:57:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9777818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiverDelta/pseuds/RiverDelta
Summary: ((Technician Lapis AU is based on this image:https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/61/e7/b9/61e7b93642fbfae8782059b264f511c9.jpg))Lapis Lazulis were incredibly powerful. Thought in more primitive times to use magic to do things like move oceans and destroy cities, they were beautiful and terrifying to ancient Gems, even to this day they command tremendous respect when on aqua-worlds.Those were the Era 1 Lapis Lazulis.Lapis, an Era 2, meanwhile, is a technician and Certified Kindergartener stuck on a ship doing her job, as she always does, which, in this case, happens to involve checking on the Peridot.





	1. Logdate 4 15 63 - Part One

"Do you have any idea what you'd done?" Lapis' voice was calm. More like monotone. It wasn't an accusation so much as a simple question. She looked down through the amber destabilization field at one of the prisoners on the ship, a Peridot. Lapis, as with all Era 2 Lapis Lazulis, had regenerated into a tight blue jumpsuit with a yellow diamond on the front, and she wore her ever-useful limb enhancers, with little blue robotic fingers floating in the air. Without these marvels of Homeworlder technology, she would be humiliatingly tiny and useless. That could never happen. Peridot, meanwhile, was short and small, with her regenerated clothing simply being a simple green dress that seemed too long for her. Peridot glared up at the taller Gem. "I know."

"Logdate 4 15 63." Lapis' right hand formed into a floating holoscreen as she spoke into her limb enhancers. "The Peridot is aware of her actions." She turned to Peridot. "Please repeat for the log what exactly you did." Lapis' eyes were cold through that translucent blue visor. Peridot made some somewhat irritated gestures. "Look, you stupid clod, I know exactly what I did! I don't need to tell you anything!" Lapis internally flinched at that. In the real world, she showed no sign of discomfort, but she wasn't as dead inside as she seemed. "Peridot. I really don't want to bother with this more than I have to." She didn't.

Peridot stopped for a bit, and finally concluded that there was nothing she could do either way. "Fine. I created a pillar out of Empire City." Lapis tilted her head at that. "What's an 'Empire City'?" Peridot sighed. "Big human settlement made largely out of metal. So...I sort of kind of demolished and reconstructed it into a giant pillar so as to get back home." Neither of them honestly cared about the idea of that city being full of humans. Lapis regarded humans as completely inconsequential, and Peridot saw them as an annoying vermin, save for Steven, who had healed up Peridot's gem, giving her the strength to pull herself along with the metal through space, until the Gem was intercepted, and here they were.

"Destroyed human city." Lapis noted, still in that same monotone. "Psychological state?" Lapis asked. Peridot looked at Lapis in confusion. "What?" Lapis continued. "Well, you're a Peridot, and one who was used as a primitive battery for more than a few millennia, so I would assume that your psychological state isn't perfect." Peridot groaned at this. "There's nothing wrong with Peridots. In fact, I probably outrank you!" She laughed in her moment of imaginary triumph. "You're not even an Era 1 Lapis!"

"I'm not going to bring up the most up-to-date source on caste placement I can find. All I'm saying is that Peridots tend to be...emotional, megalomaniacal, occasionally narcissistic, prone to obsession, and with occasional manic and depressive tendencies." She said, reading off of her holoscreen. "It's natural to want to know the psychological state of someone like you. Not that you aren't important, of course, but..." Peridot had started to get extremely annoyed at this Lapis' mechanical affect, and she decided to make it clear. "I'm fine!"

Lapis spoke into her arm enhancer microphone. "Peridot claims to be fine. Claim seems dubious. Look, Peridot. You're telling me that you go through a serious traumatic event, imprisonment, the loss of your status, and the realization that the world isn't what you remember it to be...and you're fine?" The barest hints of skepticism and curiosity seemed to penetrate Lapis' mechanical monotone. Peridot nodded. "Yes." She said. "Now, can you just go already?"

"Well, I sort of can't. You're part of my job, now, Peridot, and at this point, all I really have is this job. I've been shot at, beaten, and nearly left for dead during my time fixing the robonoids for a counter-insurrection team. I do my job. The rest of the Gems in the brig here are traitors. You're just not. So, by law, I actually have to care enough about your well-being to check on you and make sure you don't completely lose your psyche trapped here. That's just kind of how the rules work. I don't make them."

"Someone needs to fix the rules. Yellow Diamond can't be supporting this kind of waste of Gempower." Peridot asserted, as habit, though honestly she did tentatively like the idea of having someone to talk to, and Lapis just kind of shrugged. "Somehow, I can't bring myself to care." The green Gem propped herself up against a back corner of the cell. "Do you care about anything? The way you talk, you'd think you were just another robonoid." She said. "You're an incredibly boring person, Lapis."

Lapis mused that Peridot seemed to ignore why Lapis had learned just to do her job. "Peridot, 'being interesting' isn't something I particularly value. I'd rather things just be boring and consistent than be chaotic, messy, and dangerous." Peridot easily remembered her time as part of the battery. "You have no idea what it's like for things to just be boring and consistent. Go away." Lapis began to sort through files on her holoscreen, trying to find some file to tweak her robonoids' AI. "I can't. You matter too much to Homeworld."

"What? Because I'm an informant?"

"No, because you're a Peridot and an informant, and your psychology is-" She was interrupted by Peridot. "Volatile! You already said that! Stop saying it over and over again! It's insulting, you stupid clod!" She put spaces in between the 'you' and 'stupid' and the 'stupid' and 'clod', meaning it evened out to "You. Stupid. Clod." Lapis, however, had been called much worse. "That's really not much of a swear word. I would have gone with 'dirtbomb' or 'slag'." She said, as though she were fixing a minor technological error and not criticizing the way someone else talked.

"You're detached from everything, Lazuli."

"Why aren't you?" Lapis responded.

"'Why aren't you'? What? How are you qualified to give any kind of psychological help? You're terrible at this! I'm convinced that you don't even have a soul!" Peridot exclaimed. Lapis nodded. "Well, nobody does. Homeworld disproved the existence of the soul in Era 2, 8540 ADA. There was a whole scientific...thing about it, everyone kind of cheered. It was pretty nice. Still the same workday as usual for me, I guess, but some other people seemed to have liked it."

"How do you even disprove the existence of the soul? Isn't that kind of one of those great philosophical questions?"

"Don't ask me how they did it. I'm just a Kindergartener." Lapis shrugged again. "It's not my job to care about philosophy." Peridot began to rub her nose in exasperation. "I would ask if it's in your job to be a normal Gem, but you'd probably just respond that it isn't! How does anyone tolerate you? Even that stupid orange pebble must have trouble." 

"Well, most of the time, I'm not legally mandated to speak."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Image is not mine, it was found online via Google Images, please do not credit me with it. Owned by BlushMallet on Tumblr (The Tumblr is NSFW).


	2. Logdate 4 15 63 - Part Two

"Wait. If you're not legally mandated to talk to people normally, why isn't there anyone else on board? Shouldn't there be, like, some kind of Gem specialized for that to do the job?" Peridot asked, a bit confused. Lapis shrugged. "Skeleton crew." She responded. This answered absolutely none of Peridot's questions, and the tiny green Gem began to pace back and forth in her cell, letting off excess energy. "Also, if I'm that valuable, why am I in a cell and not in some actual quarters? Honestly. Yellow Diamond can't have sanctioned this! It's ridiculous!"

Lapis sighed and tried to answer Peridot's questions as best she could, though the fact that she was mostly apathetic on this bled through into her words. "Well, we have a skeleton crew because we weren't fully expected to leave Earth as we have. Earth now." She made a fist with her floating right hand. "Earth soon." She had her fingers violently repulse from each other in a miniature explosion, and made little screaming noises under her breath, speaking with an unconvincing lack of enthusiasm. "Aaaaah. No. We're being killed in a planet-breaking detonation. Our puny human lives are completely meaningless, as they've always been. Aaaah."

"You're a terrible actor."

"It's not my job to act. Basically, the Earth was going to go straight into oblivion, so they tapped an expendable Era 2 and a politically active war hero who'd make a great martyr to be the crew in case something went wrong, and it was expected that the Cluster would go off by now. The Cluster being that particular bomb that would...you know...win the war. The reason why you're in a cell right now is because of the martyr in question. Given that she's not a martyr at the moment, and is still pursuing her stupid vendetta against someone who's probably gone by now, basically everyone associated with the still-functional Rose Quartz-" Her usual undercurrent of dry sarcasm turned to an all-consuming flood. "-has to be treated like an enemy. Even informants on our side to begin with."

"That's the great Jasper? A paranoid idiot fighting against a ghost?" Peridot said, tilting her head in disbelief. "I don't buy it. She nearly defeated the Renegade Pearl, back when I was alive. I heard stories, everyone was talking about it. You wouldn't know what the Renegade Pearl could do, would you?" She scoffed. "Of course not. When were you made? A century ago?"

"Six centuries ago, so not as new as you'd think, and I'm aware of what Jasper did. It's just that losing to a Pearl isn't an accomplishment. I could probably beat her, and I can barely lift a liter of water, let alone do what an Era 1 could." Lapis said. Peridot rolled her eyes and responded. "Oh, sure. Do you want to actually let the Renegade Pearl go and have a round?" Peridot gave a bit of a cackle, which really began to grate on Lapis. It was the laughing equivalent of sandpaper to the face. 

"No. That would be completely against protocol. I might be reprimanded for it, and honestly, I don't have the energy to deal with that slag. I've fought in wars, though. I could do it."

"You?" Peridot laughed again. "What wars?"

"Minor colonial rebellions, mainly, in the last three centuries. I was a maintenance tech who became a robonoid operator, and it was after the last war I was given Kindergartener training for terraforming with Era 1s. Rather than see any more of those smug, tall, water-controlling jerks who just casually play with oceans, I signed up to go to Earth for this. Everyone said it would be an easy job. Get in, get out. Check on the things that need to be checked on. Fix anything that's broken. Oh, and I'd even get to be under the great war hero Jasper." Lapis rolled her eyes. "I think she's a domineering lunatic, she thinks I have a nice butt in this regeneration's jumpsuit. I try to just ignore her and do my job.

"The problem is that her idea of what my job should be isn't what my job actually is." It seemed that this was a topic that Lapis actually was willing to go on about. Maybe she'd even bottled some of this up. "She's always talking about Rose Quartz. Where's Rose Quartz? Can we send out probes to find Rose Quartz? What she's going to do when we meet with Rose Quartz. How she'll get revenge for Pink Diamond. How we need to prepare for war with the Crystal Gems. I think she can't tolerate being on a mission that doesn't revolve her, honestly. Well, that and her inability to get over that stupid vendetta. It's annoying and she keeps trying to get me to break protocol to help her."

"Geez. Are you OK? You're showing emotion, and it's weirding me out."

Lapis realized she'd been pacing and ranting in a slightly melodramatic fashion, and stopped to collect her composure. "I have a lot of...emotion, Peridot. I just try not to let it interfere with the slag I go through all the time. Best to just give up and do your job."


	3. Glitch Gem

It had been one Earth day between the first conversation between Lapis and Peridot. This was not because Lapis and Peridot cared much about one another or anything. Their relationship had purely been one of apathetic captor and insubordinate prisoner. No, this was because Lapis had all sorts of garbage to do in the meantime. Rewiring robonoids, refilling their solidified adhesive gel reserves, making small changes in the ship's trajectory according to what humans would dub basic Newtonian physics, and writing up copious reports of all of these activities, and, more importantly, her brief, largely annoying and meaningless experiences on Earth.

Not that Lapis found Steven to be especially annoying. On the contrary, his positivity was charming. At any rate, she finally returned back to Peridot's cell, Steven still fresh in the technician's mind. "Peridot, what was it like meeting Steven?" Lapis honestly was genuinely curious, as it wasn't as though she'd rather be arguing about nothing with the tiny little lunatic. Peridot shrugged. "Lazuli, that's a pretty long story right there." Lapis smiled a tiny, almost imperceptible bit. "Yeah, well, I have the time to listen."

"It all began with the battery."

_ Far before Steven had ever been captured, before he even knew there were Gems outside of the three he called family, the boy in the pink shirt happened to be sitting on the green rug up in his room, playing Monster Quest Mini, a spin-off of the famous Golf Quest series. He had a can of soda next to him by the floor, and he took frequent sips as he relaxed and enjoyed himself. In the game, he had three party members aside from his character, STEVEN, those being the stalwart Buck, the finicky Elesa, and the former villain-turned-hero Blizzard, the latter being his most powerful party member, due to her somewhat overpowered ice magic. _

_ He stared at his TV, the four characters about to face off against Drageon, a high-level Quest Monster. Things looked good. STEVEN was trained in all sorts of healing skills, mostly bardic ones, and had enough Monster Balls to catch an army, Buck's sword was enhanced with numerous spells, Elesa was...useless, as always, and Blizzard was in the back in case they had to just knock out Drageon due to something going horribly wrong. Sixty-six potions in the BAG. Just enough status healing items for things like being burned or frozen to be useful, not so much as to be a waste of money. _

_ The power went out. _

_ The entire house was not quite plunged into darkness, given that there was a very large floor-to-ceiling window right next to Steven, but it was extremely annoying, especially as Steven had only saved before the Dungeon of Elemental Darkness, meaning he'd have a good hour to go if he wanted to get back to where he was, all through cutscenes from Elesa about some honestly sort of boring plot details. "Awwww." He said, sighing. "Hey, uh...Do we have a generator or something? I kinda was hoping to beat Monster Quest Mini today, and..."  _

_ "What's a generator?" Amethyst asked, thumbing through a magazine. _

_ "It's a thing that makes electricity." To be entirely honest, Steven didn't really know how a generator worked, and sort of guessed that Amethyst didn't know either.  _

_ "Dude, we have one of those. Kind of. Like...we've got a battery. Think we could hook it up to the TV?" _

_ Pearl sighed. "Amethyst, please. The Gem on that is broken, it wouldn't even work. That battery's just a relic. Don't get his hopes up." _

_ "Yeah, well, I kind of wanted to see the ending of Monster Quest Mini, P, so can we at least give it a shot?" _

_ "Fine." _

_ Amethyst did a little triumphant fist pump, and Steven grinned, the both of them happily looking at one another in their shared moment of victory. Pearl, meanwhile, went into the temple and drew from her own room what looked like a mishmash between a car battery, a green gem, and a lump of yellow crystal from her room, along with some jumper cables from Amethyst's room. Why Amethyst had jumper cables, she had no idea. She walked up to Steven's room and clamped alligator clips properly, linking with some jury-rigging the outlet and the battery, as the battery had some convenient wire coils to...clamp things around. _

_ After that, the lights went back on as though nothing had happened, and Steven sighed, ready to repeat the same dungeon, cutscenes and all. However, something wasn't quite right. Instead of the princess, Elesa, talking, Blizzard began to speak. Well, not speak, per se, but her text box opened up at the bottom of the screen. **[Hello? Is anyone reading this?]** _

**_ YES/NO _ **

_ Steven hit the 'YES' option, a bit confused. _

_ **[Have ten thousand gold.]**  
_

_ Steven pressed 'A' on his controller to end the message, only bringing up another one. He quickly opened up his inventory and and checked how much money he had, and sure enough, his cash had jumped up by ten thousand gold pieces. "But...I can't spend that anywhere." _

**_ [Want me to make a shop?] _ **

_ "That would be cheating, right?" _

**_ [I just want to help. You're treating me like a person. I haven't gotten that for a while. What's your name?] _ **

_ "Um, Steven." _

**_ [Steven. Can you...can you free me?] _ **

_ "How would I free you?" _

_ At that point, Pearl ran up the stairs and began to yell. "No, no, no, no, no, no! We're not doing this! We didn't...go through everything just to let someone else come and..." She tried to get her thoughts across, but honestly, she just couldn't at the moment. That would be a grave oversight. On the TV, the dungeon crawling screen turned into a pre-rendered cutscene clearly not made by the developers, of a poorly-rendered 3D Steven taking out the triangular gem from the battery. Pearl tried to intercept him, but he was far closer to the battery, and he yanked it out, electricity sparking from the husk of what once powered the house. _

_ The lights turned off again. _

_ The cracked gem glowed, and eventually, around it, formed a tiny sort of gremlin, with TV-screen static instead of eyes. Her voice had a nasally quality, but also a buzzing one, and her motions were quick but jerky. Like she had omitted frames of her own motion, her limbs teleporting very short distances instead of normally moving. "Thanks." She smiled a bit and leapt from Steven's room down to the house itself, her hand jerking behind her to disassemble the TV into a kind of levitating platform for her to surf on, which she jumped onto deftly, beginning to speed out of the house. _

_ "Steven, I'm going to find somewhere with enough metal to get home. I can't do it just on my own power. Come home with me. This place is nothing compared to home. See you there, I suppose. You clods better not follow him!" The last sentence was said, of course, to the Crystal Gems. Pearl tried to throw her spear at the platform, but it disappeared further and further into the sky, Peridot sticking her tongue out at the group. _


End file.
